Arctic Dawn (The Norse Chronicles Book 2) (3 page)

I raised my hand and formed a fireball in my palm. Its presence comforted me as I contemplated the shadowy figure. After four weeks in San Diego, a week of traveling on the road, and four weeks lost to transmutation, I should have been a ghost. I had been so careful.

How did they find me? And who are “they”? Friend or foe, enemy or ally?

I spun on my heel and ducked back inside my room. From my closet, I dug out my duffel bags and chucked in piles of clothes—clean, dirty, crusty, it didn’t matter. The fight-or-flight instinct was saying
Go! Now!
But a cooler, calmer voice cut through the panic:
You just saw a blackbird that could change shape. How do you run from that?
Slow down and think.

After sinking to the floor beside my bed, I hugged my knees, buried my face in my lap, and inhaled several deep breaths. Running was pointless when I had no idea what I was fleeing from or how best to get away from it.

I raised my head, rubbed my face, and crawled back to my window. When nothing ominous appeared, my shoulders slumped, and I heaved a sigh.
Time to start forming an exit strategy.
Until then, I would stand my ground and stay aware and on guard.
And why is Thorin’s face the one I see whenever I think about where to run?

Chapter Four

T
he sun was halfway into its workday by the time I rolled out of bed. I had slept later than usual because my disturbing encounters had kept me up until the wee hours of dawn. I paced the living room throughout the night, waiting for someone to break in or for a wolf to show up on my fire escape. Was it coincidence that the crow had appeared a day after Nikka caught a stranger staring at me outside the diner? Perhaps he’d been checking me out simply because he had a thing for blondes. Exhaustion eventually sent me back to bed, and I squeezed in a few hours of restless, dreamless sleep.

I started a pot of coffee and stumbled into the bathroom to wash my face and brush out my bed-head hair. When Mr. Coffee chimed a few minutes later, I drooled like Pavlov’s dog. After adding a dab of sweetener and a touch of half-and-half to my cup, I sank into my bedraggled sofa cushions, clutching my mug, careful not to spill a drop. It was the kind of sofa that molded around me, sucked me in, and held me in its seductive embrace. The couch was ugly, but our love for each other transcended surface appearances.

Beyond my window, the San Diego traffic rushed by. Someone yelled. A car horn honked. The outside world fell away as I sipped my coffee. Amazing, how a simple cup of java could have that kind of power.

With my coffee pot emptied and caffeine buzz securely in place, I checked the time on my alarm clock—four hours until my shift started, plenty of time—and exchanged my PJs for jeans, a T-shirt, and a plain gray hoodie. I wound my hair into a tight knot, pulled up my hood, and slipped on a pair of sunglasses.

A few minutes later, I stood at the stop around the corner from my apartment, waiting for an MTS bus to pick me up and carry me across town to a random branch of the San Diego Public Library. In an effort to cover my trail, I picked a different branch every time. When the bus arrived, it lumbered up to the curb, its brakes hissed, and the doors opened. I climbed aboard behind a woman toting a collapsible shopping cart and a grumpy preschooler, and I paid my fare in cash. I paid for
everything
in cash. No one aboard the bus seemed to notice me. No one raised his or her head or looked me in the face. I settled into a seat near the front and slouched against the window for the entirety of the trip.

After a long ride extended by multiple stops, the bus wheezed to a halt outside the University Community Library, and I slipped out onto the sidewalk. As I scanned the parking lot, double-checking for signs of pursuit or surveillance, I pulled a prepaid burner phone from my pocket, reconnected the battery, and turned it on. I had bought and activated it when my cross-country bus had stopped in Iowa to refuel at a truck stop doubling as a shopping mall.

I had watched enough true-crime shows to know, at least in theory, about triangulating location based on cell-tower signals. I never turned on the phone near my apartment. Even with all my precautions, using it was still a risk but one I needed to take.

I punched in a memorized phone number and waited.

Two rings later, a familiar voice answered and said, “Thorin Adventure Outfitters, Hugh Rabe speaking.”

Hugh.
Val Wotan’s roommate. Exactly the person I’d hoped to reach. If Val or Thorin had answered, I would have hung up. The thought of hearing either of their voices again, even after all we had been through… It pained me. In a way, I missed them—even Val. He was an oaf, overbearing and manipulative, but I refused to believe he was unredeemable. He was complicated and screwed up, but we all were. And Thorin…
Gah!
I couldn’t wrap my brain around him, much less my heart.

“Hi,” I said, trying to flatten my southern accent into something less distinguishable. “I was wondering if Skyla Ramirez was around. I did a kayaking trip with her a while ago, and I wanted to talk to her about planning a group outing for me and some friends in the spring.”

“Skyla is on an extended sabbatical,” Hugh said.

That was the same excuse he had given me when I called the week before and asked to speak to her. That time, I had posed as a journalist wanting to interview Skyla for an article about women making a living in the sporting industry. I had made up some excuse every week, for the past four weeks, to call Thorin’s store and ask about her. In all that time, Hugh’s story never changed. Thorin Adventure Outfitter’s official statement on Skyla’s whereabouts may have meant Thorin thought she was alive but missing. Or maybe he thought she was dead but wouldn’t admit it without official evidence.

“Do you know when she’ll be back?” I asked.

“I don’t, but I can take a message.”

“No,” I said, throwing a little annoyance into my tone, the better to fool him into thinking I was a disgruntled customer. “Maybe I’ll just try to find another guide.”

After I hung up with Hugh, I disassembled my phone and went into the library and logged onto a public computer. Logging in required a library account number. Library account numbers required photo IDs and physical addresses, but in my experience, librarians were a softhearted bunch who easily succumbed to young women bearing sob stories about broken California dreams and unstable living conditions. The librarian on whose shoulder I cried had offered me a temporary account number that would last until I brought back my credentials and registered for a permanent account. Until then, they wouldn’t lend me books, but I could access the Internet.

Just as I did every week, I conducted an exhaustive online search for anything that might lead me to Skyla—or as exhaustive as could be performed in the hour the library allotted for computer use. So far, I had found nothing but old history: a brief mention of Kara North’s marriage to Neron Ramirez in the
San Diego Tribune
. Vital records showed Skyla and her brother, Paul, had been born there too, but military families moved around a lot, and I lost track of the Ramirezes in New York. I had already followed my few New York leads to dead ends in conjunction with my visit to Oneida Lake. After those fruitless searches, I backtracked the Ramirezes’ trail to its start with hopes of finding a new thread.

Paul Ramirez, Skyla’s brother, had disappeared after high-school graduation, and he seemed to have no social presence online. Skyla’s parents, Neron and Kara, had vanished similarly. Was the cause of their disappearance magic, malice, or something more common, such as sickness or death? Asking questions while constructing an in-depth investigation was difficult when trying to remain anonymous. The United States military and government-records offices tended to shrug off young women who wouldn’t give contact information or personal details.

My searches resulted in more of the same disappointments, and I was running out of ideas.

In the past weeks, I had discovered plenty of news about my own disappearance. Not long after my transformative experience at Oneida Lake, my parents had issued a missing-person notice, and the Siqiniq Police and Alaska State Troopers circulated a press release asking for information about my possible whereabouts. No one had put as much effort into locating Skyla, but she deserved better treatment than that. She had saved my life. Searching for her was the least I could do in return.

An hour later, my time ran out on the computer, and the system logged me out. I leaned back from the screen, rubbed my eyes, and stretched. Then I slipped on my hood and sunglasses and went outside to catch the bus back across town.

Another day of fruitless searching had confirmed what I’d already accepted in the depths of my heart. I wasn’t going to find Skyla by hiding out in San Diego any longer. I had recovered the majority of my fire, and I would have to hit the road again soon. Helen was probably the most direct resource for information on Skyla, but I wasn’t brave enough, or
dumb
enough, to face her alone. I needed backup for that kind of confrontation.
So, back to Alaska and the Nordic deities who contest my every move? Or return to the Aerie and take my chances among the potentially compromised Valkyries?

I had gone to San Diego because Skyla’s family had established its foundations there, and it seemed like a good place to search for new leads. It was far away from my home in North Carolina, no one had reason to look for me there, and I had needed a place to hide while recovering my strength. If I admitted I had done all I could on my own, and my search required my making a more…
public
nuisance of myself, then the time had come. But if I reached out and reconnected, I’d have to decide whom I most trusted to support my goals. Thorin’s image appeared in my thoughts—the look in his eyes when I’d last seen him, when he had told me he was not like Val and would not make his mistakes. At the time, I thought Thorin meant he wouldn’t force his affections on me, but in the weeks that had passed, I wondered if Thorin meant he wouldn’t make the mistake of getting close to me or letting me get close to him.

Good thing I didn’t need his intimacy. I only needed results. Of all the supernatural beings in my life who could help me find Skyla, Thorin was the one I most believed in, a man not much on words but big on action.
Guess I just made up my mind.

Back in my apartment, I spent my remaining free time washing dishes and packing my paltry laundry in tote bags so my things would be ready to go at a moment’s notice. In the late afternoon, I tossed aside my cleaning rag and donned my bartending armor, a psychological shield constructed of layers of patience, humility, and a healthy sense of humor. I also put on a bowling shirt printed with the “Stefanakis Spirits and Suds” logo and a dark pair of jeans that hid spills and stains. I tied my hair up in a messy knot and headed for the door. Successful bartending relied on a careful balance of being attractive but not too attractive. After too many beers or bourbons, customers sometimes developed possessive inclinations toward me. I did my best to discourage them in advance.

The commute from my apartment to my office took all of thirty seconds, the time required to lock my door, jog down a short flight of stairs, and step through the bar’s back door into the storage room.

“Sabrina,” Nikka said in greeting.

“Nikka,” I said in return. She had brought racks of clean glassware from the dishwasher to the bar, and I helped her stock the shelves.

“You ready for tonight?” she asked.

“You think it will be as bad as last Friday?”

Nikka nodded. “The band I scheduled for tonight has a pretty dedicated fan base.”

“Rock?” I asked, trying to predict the crowd.

“Nah, more like folk.”

“So, more PBR and less Bud?”

“Yes,” Nikka said and rolled her eyes. “I can’t stand assholes who drink beer ironically” —she rubbed her fingers together— “but I have to love them because they drink so damned much of it.”

Nikka and I hustled to restock well liquors and inventory the premium brands. She filled ice wells and opened several beer taps to release air from the lines while I sliced limes and oranges for our garnish trays. The first few regulars trickled in: two old guys who drank shots of ouzo between glasses of an imported Greek beer I had never heard of until I started working at Stefanakis.

Nikka’s bar attracted an eclectic mix: old guys from the nearby Greek community loyal to Nikka’s dad and his bar; professionals stopping in for a drink before they headed home for the night; and a trendy, younger population who came to Stefanakis looking for an “authentic” experience. Nikka and I slipped into our routines without the need for chatter. In our four weeks together, I had learned most of the steps to the bartender’s dance, and Nikka and I made pretty fabulous partners.

Tre showed up for bouncer duty around the same time the band arrived to set up. I poured him a glass of sweet tea, a delicacy in those parts. He swore I made it like his grandma had when he was a kid in Alabama, so I made a point to brew a fresh batch for him whenever Nikka put him on the schedule.

Tre took the glass from me, chugged down half, and smacked his lips in a show of appreciation. “What do you know about banana pudding?” He handed the glass back to me for a refill.

“I know everything there is to know. Why do you ask?”

Tre made puppy-dog eyes at me. “I can’t even tell you how long it’s been since I had a real homemade banana pudding.”

“Oh, yeah? If I made you one, what would be in it for me?”

Tre’s eyes narrowed. He chewed his bottom lip and considered what bargaining chip to offer.

The band’s guitar and drums kicked in as their technician tweaked the sound system’s idiosyncrasies. Dissonant notes reverberated around the room, and microphone feedback stabbed my eardrums.

Tre winced and yelled over the noise, “We’ll settle this later.”

I winked at him and turned to greet my latest customer. He was no Greek patriarch or trendy college kid but a dark-haired, blue-eyed stranger. He settled his tall frame onto a stool near the register and ordered a black and tan.

“You want to start a tab?” I asked.

He rolled a shoulder. “Sure.”

“Under what name?”

“Rolf Lockhart.”

“Rolf? That’s not a name you hear every day.”

“No. It’s old—a family name.”

“Haven’t seen you in here before, Rolf.” I made friendly chitchat because that’s what bartenders did and because something about the man drew me in. My immediate, visceral response to him upset my careful composure, and not in a good way. My defenses snapped into place, and my suspicion flipped into high-alert mode.

“Haven’t been here before. I’d ask how long you’ve been around, but I can tell by your accent that it hasn’t been very long. You’re a southern girl, yes?”

“Yes,” I said and cursed my ingrained twang. If I concentrated, I could neutralize my accent, but Rolf had caught me off guard. I finished pouring his beer, careful to stack the Guinness above the paler Bass without mixing the two.

“Whereabouts?” Rolf paused to sip his beer. “I have family in Mississippi.”

“Uh, no. I’m not from Mississippi.”

A woman beside Rolf yelled for a Heineken. I drew a cold bottle from the cooler and poured it into a frosted glass. She gave me a ten and I passed back her change.

“But I’m sure it’s nice,” I said.

Rolf’s lips twisted into a wry grin. “That’s debatable.”

I shrugged and scooted past him, heading for a customer waving at me from farther down the bar.

“You still haven’t told me where you’re from,” Rolf said when I returned to pour a pint for another customer.

Sure, I had a fake back story, but explaining it to Rolf only invited him to ask more questions. I humored Nikka and Tre’s inquiries to an extent because I needed them, and they had befriended me. But that guy… I owed him nothing, and my instincts said to push him away quickly. I remembered a quote in my latest spy thriller, the words of Eugene V. Debs: “‘I have no country to fight for. My country is the earth. I am a citizen of the world.’”